tag: IMS

Multi-beam litho shakeout
The multi-beam e-beam market for lithography applications continues to undergo a shakeout amid technical roadblocks and other issues.
Last week, ASML announced that it had acquired the intellectual-property (IP) assets of Mapper Lithography, a Dutch supplier of multi-beam e-beam tools for lithography applications that fell into bankruptcy late last year.
As it t... » read more

Fab tools/manufacturing
Lam Research has accepted Martin Anstice’s resignation as chief executive and a member of the board. Lam has named Tim Archer as president and chief executive effective immediately. Archer, who served as Lam’s president and chief operating officer, has been named to the board. One analyst provided a comment on the situation at Lam. “In our view, Mr. Archer is very... » read more

Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography is moving closer to realization, but several problems involving scanner uptime, photoresists and pellicles need to be resolved before this long-overdue technology is put into full production.
Intel, Samsung and TSMC are hoping to insert EUV into production at 7nm and/or 5nm. While the remaining issues don’t necessarily pre-empt using EUV, they do affec... » read more

The confidence level remains high for extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography, although the timing of the insertion remains a moving target, according to a new survey released by the eBeam Initiative.
At the same time, the outlook for the overall photomask industry is bullish, according to the survey. On the downside, however, there appears to be no progress in terms of improving mask turnaro... » read more

While I’ve been involved in Women In Microwaves for many years now, beginning in 2011 with my chairmanship of what was then only a WIM social hour at IMS, until this year I had never participated in the WIM panel sessions that were expanded from the social hour starting several years ago. In Hawaii this year that changed when I was invited to join in the 2017 WIM panel, “Inspiring the Next ... » read more

Chipmakers are readying their next-generation technologies based on 10nm and/or 7nm finFETs, but it's still not clear how long the finFET will last, how long the 10nm and 7nm nodes for high-end devices will be extended, and what comes next.
The industry faces a multitude of uncertainties and challenges at 5nm, 3nm and beyond. Even today, traditional chip scaling continues to slow as process ... » read more

Chipmakers
Toshiba’s problems have gone from bad to worse. “Toshiba postponed its earnings call by up to one month, and the chairman resigned. The provisional results show large losses in its nuclear power business, while the NAND operations remain very profitable,” said Weston Twigg, an analyst with Pacific Crest Securities, in a research note. “The next few months appear very uncerta... » read more

Elmar Platzgummer, chief executive of IMS Nanofabrication, sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to discuss the company’s deal with Intel, photomasks, multi-beam mask writer technology and other topics. What follows are excerpts of that conversation.
SE: This has been a significant year for IMS for two reasons. First, Intel recently announced plans to acquire IMS. Second, at the recent ... » read more

Leading-edge photomask makers face a multitude of challenges as they migrate from the 14nm node and beyond.
Mask making is becoming more challenging and expensive at each node on at least two fronts. On one front, mask makers must continue to invest in the development of traditional optical masks at advanced nodes. On another front, several photomask vendors are preparing for the possible ra... » read more